Recently mobile communications terminals including cellular phones equipped with a GPS function have come into widespread use, and a variety of applications of the technology can be observed. In some cases, the aforesaid terminals have been used to find whereabouts of wandering elderly people or missing children, and in other cases, used to search for stolen vehicles.
However, if the power of the mobile communications terminal equipped with a GPS function, which the user is always carrying, is intentionally cut off by someone else, the user's current location information cannot be known, and then there is a problem that the user's convenience and benefits is decreased. The term “intentionally” here refers to a case where a malicious person intends to commit a wrongdoing, disguising his or her current position by preventing the correct location of the phone from being known, which would remind us of criminal actions such as kidnappings, abductions, or captivities. On the other hand, there is a problem that the user, who is carrying the mobile communications terminal equipped with a GPS function, may have inadvertently forgotten to turn on the power, for example, after they turned it off so as to use public transportation services.
For instance, “Patent document 1” discloses a system in which once a mobile terminal entering a place such as a hospital or a museum where use of the mobile terminal is not desirable is detected by using a GPS satellite, the power of the mobile terminal is automatically turned off.
“Patent document 2” discloses a system capable of transmitting position information detected by a GPS before turning off the power of a mobile terminal in public places.
It is Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2001-160985 bulletin [patent document 1]
It is Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-009203 bulletin [patent document 2]